


Picking Through Your Mind

by ObsidianMichi



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Fluff n' stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-23 23:05:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7483500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObsidianMichi/pseuds/ObsidianMichi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dirthamen and Eirwen walk the streets of Val Royeaux as they go out to eat, discussing revolution and conquest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Picking Through Your Mind

**Author's Note:**

> Fair Warning, this ties in to my larger long fic: The Lady in Blue and White.
> 
> Context is assumed.

Eirwen led Dirthamen into the Val Royeaux marketplace. Warm sunlight dappled the flattened granite roads. Sandstone walls rose up on either side as the statues of various historical figures stared down at them. 

“It smells,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “Rank.” He paused and sniffed. “Like that flower from the gardens we visited.”

“Roses,” she replied. “It’s the Val Royeaux spring collection of perfume, popular among the nobility.”

“Yes,” he nodded. “Perfume is it precisely, Renan. Rose petals attempting to hide the aroma of stale piss, moldy straw, sweaty armpits, and unwashed feet.” His upper lip curled. “These people, they do not bathe.”

Hiding a smile, Eirwen glanced up at him. “You wanted to come here.”

“I wanted to visit civilization,” he replied.

Eirwen grinned as he took hold of her right hand. “You didn’t specify whose.”

Dirthamen glanced down at her, shaggy black bangs hanging across his brow. He was dressed simply. A loose black shirt underneath a black doublet, and leather pants of the same color. “True,” he agreed. A grin flashed a perfect set of white teeth. “Well played, Renan.” He leaned a little closer, golden eyes glittering. “I will be more specific in the future.”

Eirwen swallowed, flush creeping up her neck. She suspected when he said civilization, he’d meant  _ elven _ civilization. Specifically, the Dalish, and more specifically Clan Lavellan.  _ I’m just not sure I’m ready for that. _ Especially given the way Solas reacted to the Dalish. She’d never taken him home, either.

“Mmm,” she murmured, looking away. “Do that.”

“So,” he leaned closer, calmly tucking her arm around his elbow. “Shall we explore this miserable mud pit?”

Eirwen tilted her head, lifting her brows as she swallowed a giggle. “If you think the marketplace of Val Royeaux is a mud heap, just wait until you find a Dalish encampment.”

One black eyebrow arched in return. “I’ve higher expectations of the culture in control of their lands. There is only so much one can do while living in a forest. These humans are the ruling class, correct?”

“The ones wearing higher quality clothes and traveling with entourages,” she replied. “The poor are the same everywhere, and we’re unlikely to see them here. The elves are confined to living the Alienages, down in the slums.”

“Allowed out only for work among the humans as a servant class,” Dirthamen said with a nod. Whether he’d deduced the information, yanked it from a nearby mind, or it was part of what he’d pulled from hers, Eirwen didn’t know. “Thus ensuring they remain separate from the humans, and reminded of their inferiority.”

“The elven merchants are also confined to the Alienages, where they sell their wares,” Eirwen added. “They can’t afford permits from the mayoral council. If they manage to acquire one, the nobles who rent space often won’t grant them use of their shops.”

“While the surface dwarves move everywhere,” Dirthamen replied, “though they have no organization outside the Carta. They are similarly stigmatized, but it takes on a different shape.”

“Mmm,” she nodded.

Eirwen discovered Dirthamen learned quickly. His powers of observation were formidable. Occasionally opinionated to the point of rude, he often kept his judgements to himself. Still, his forthrightness surprised her. Reminded her more of Abelas than Solas. However, Dirthamen was not safe in the confines of distant ruins but rather where any offended party might attack him.

If the idea bothered him, he never showed it.

No matter where they traveled, he never quite seemed to fit. He took no issues with the alien way he was treated. He had a way of standing out, but it didn’t surprise him. He treated the trait as familiar. Used to not quite meshing with the world around him, Dirthamen accorded himself all the respect of a poorly kept secret. 

He didn’t seem to mind much if someone noticed he didn’t fit. When they questioned his behavior, he enjoyed it. Whether human, elven, dwarven, or Qunari, he approved of being noticed.

“Gaudy golden bannisters, marble walls, windows of stained glass, all the while unable to hide its stink,” he said. “Locking their mages up in towers when they could use them as cleaning crew.”

Eirwen frowned, the image of Vivienne bent over and scrubbing the stones, blasting away refuse with a few well placed fireballs flashing through her mind. “You’re cold.”

“Always be grateful for another’s lack of imagination, Renan,” Dirthamen said. “Their superstitions, their naivete, and their ignorance. Fear is a powerful motivator. If they are locking their mages away in towers, then they have no means of controlling them in their entirety.” He paused. “Or they do not want to.” 

“The Orlesians are Andrastian,” Eirwen replied. “Most of them believe magic and the pursuit of power are the sin which caused the Blight.”

Dirthamen’s lips twitched. “They are not entirely wrong.”

She smiled. “I guess not, but magic must be safeguarded away to protect the population.”

“And blood mages punished,” Dirthamen added thoughtfully. “All while the uneducated locals associate it with demons.”

“You should watch out,” she said. “With your proclivities, the Templars would make you tranquil.”

He smiled. “They are welcome to try.”

Eirwen’s lips pursed. She doubted either the Seekers or the Templars would get very far, but bloodshed was preferably avoided. “You’re right, though,” she said. “The vast majority of the populations in every country don’t understand how to deal with magic. They rely on the Templars to keep them safe.”

“An interesting hole in their defenses,” Dirthamen replied. “One worth worrying until it gives.”

“What are you suggesting?” she asked.

“Nothing so grand,” he replied. “Only that ignorance and naivete are the means by which one slips in and seizes a government by its throat.” His eyes swung about the square, a canny smile on his lips. “There are always holes, Renan. Fear like this leads one to board up all the walls and windows, turn away. We move where they failed to look.”  
“Oh,” Eirwen whispered. A campaign built on the local’s fear and superstition. Why hadn’t she ever thought of it before? _Probably because it worsens the problem in the long run._ They hadn’t been planning a war then, though. “Yes, I see.”

“I know,” he said. “It is why I enjoy your company.”

“If we make them afraid, if they don’t understand, then they’ll think it’s impossible and give up.” She smiled. “You don’t think, you just run!”

“Exactly,” Dirthamen replied. “Fear, Renan, is how you win without losing a man or firing a single shot.”

“And by the time they realize they’ve been fooled, it’s too late. You’re already entrenched.” She grinned, the possibilities were endless. “Oh, I like that! They just open the gates and let you in.”

He chuckled, patting her hand. “You are easy to please.”

“I have a lot to learn,” Eirwen countered. “I might as well pick through your mind.”

“The same is true for myself as well,” Dirthamen replied. “You guide me to uncover what I do not know nor understand.”

“That’s why we’re here,” Eirwen said, gesturing toward the market with her projection. “We’ve all the necessary amenities in food, books, bedding, and clothing, with an additional serving of the most important factor any elf experiences across Thedas.”

Dirthamen glanced at her, then back at the crowd milling in the square. 

A few human eyes had turned toward them, visible through their white masks. Ladies in small groups giggling behind their fans, eyeing Dirthamen with interest. Guards at the entry stared at them and only them. A few men leered at at her. A merchant behind the golden fence spat a gob of phlegm onto the cobblestones.

“Prejudice,” she said.

“Ah,” he murmured. “Yes, I expected this.”

“It’s one thing to see it in my mind,” she said. “Another to experience the reality.”

Dirthamen chuckled. “Then, we’d best ensure we do not end the day beaten in an alley.”

She smiled, letting him tug her closer. “I’d love to see a street tough try to mug you, Dirthamen.”

“Dirthan,” he said softly. “Your Divine knows Fen’Harel walks the world. Best not to raise suspicion.”

Eirwen sighed. “I know, even the walls have ears.”

“In Arlathan, they did,” Dirthamen replied cheerfully. “We required multiple wards to keep the ears out. Here, your mages lack the necessary skill to transform the local inanimate objects into allies.” 

Laughing, Eirwen shook her head. “We may surprise you.”

“Then,” he replied, “when we wander the Grand Cathedral, we shall lay down a few spells.”

Eirwen nodded. She didn’t consider Cassandra her Divine, friend perhaps, and an enemy destined by beliefs and conflicting goals. She’d aided in placing her on the Sunburst Throne, but that had been with the goal of restoring peace to Southern Thedas. They did not see matters in Thedas the same way.

Cassandra was a moderate. She believed people were flawed, they failed the system. She’d never had reason to see it another way. 

Eirwen could not look at the world and see the same dream made manifest. As an elven mage, she was doubly cursed. Safeguarded from a choice between a life on the run or a life in the Circle only by virtue of her status as the Herald of Andraste.

No matter what Cassandra and the rest believed, she’d never seen herself as a divinely chosen savior.  _ The human god wasn’t any more real to me than the Creators. _

It turned to her favor now. The world no longer saw the Inquisitor when they looked at her. Red hair turned silver-white, skin bleached to the same color of pure snow, she’d gone from conventionally lovely to what some humans considered alluring and mystically exotic.

She didn’t care for it. As a round faced, innocent redhead, they’d had a hard time recognizing her face. Unless she was in uniform, someone always mistook her for a servant. It didn’t change. White haired and without vallaslin, they just assumed she was a some lord’s mistress.

_ They see what they want. _

“Dirthan,” she agreed. “What would you like to see first?”

“To begin, you ignored breakfast,” he replied smoothly.

Eirwen sighed. “There were council meetings.”

“No excuse, Renan,” he said. “I suggest we begin at a nearby restaurant selling whatever resembles sustenance.”

She glared at him. “If they don’t serve elves?”

“They will,” Dirthamen replied calmly, then he winked at her. “One way or another.”

Eirwen sighed. “Fine.” She doubted she could dissuade him. “So long as no one gets hurt.”

He hit her with a long, slanted stare from underneath long black lashes.

She smiled. “Much.”

Dirthamen sighed. “I will accept the compromise and rise to the challenge.”

Eirwen laughed, pulling him toward the gate.

Spending time with Dirthamen was more refreshing than she wanted to admit. His callousness toward life disturbed her sometimes, but he walked without any fear or doubt. He didn’t cling to the tattered shreds of pride or haul himself up in a society intent on dragging him down into the mud. He knew his worth. He didn’t sneak about on the edges hoping to avoid notice. He came from a time when elves were the center of the world. Sneering, jibes, slurs, and slights amused him.

Solas cared if he was liked or listened to.

Dirthamen didn’t.

He enjoyed the tests, and the way she attempted to suss him out. If he was running a long game against her, it didn’t rely on keeping her away from information about himself. He laid out his plans openly, re-take control of Thedas with a goal of ending the Blight.

Exhilarating, his thoughts on world conquest.

Arm in arm, they walked through the gate and into the market. Two elves out for a stroll, walking in one of the most dangerous places in the world.

Well, dangerous for their kind.

Without the veneer of status or Inquisition protection, they were just two nicely dressed targets. Minorities often were, especially those with money.

Eirwen led him past the fountain and down la Rue du Chevalier-de-la-Montrefont toward the only place she’d ever eaten at when visiting Val Royeaux, Caf é de Flore. An open air cafe which looked out on the Belle March é , its long wooden tables and rough seating providing a rustic theme which amused the Orlesian nobility. The food was mostly edible, though most Orlesian confections were bathed in either sugar or gravy.

Vivienne, Cole, and Iron Bull enjoyed eating there, but Eirwen’s visits had often been more about business than pleasure. Varric preferred The Lady’s Armistice, what he referred to as “the stinking shithole” down by the docks. The stench of manure and ale that tasted like stale piss reminded him of home.

She’d wandered in a few times and promptly wandered right back out again.

_ Smuggler nests, gambling dens, hives of local thieves, and others considered scum are probably best to put off until I have a better read. _

Dirthamen didn’t seem the type to take offense over a bit of honest spit to the eye or an attempted pickpocket, but she preferred if the nobles of Val Royeaux risked his wrath first. Of all those in the city, they were the least likely to experience harship while simultaneously the most deserving.

“So,” Eirwen began as they approached Caf é de Flore, “what was food in Arlathan like?”

“A broad question,” Dirthamen replied. “One should know, broad questions often lead to generic answers.”

“And the generic is the bane of your existence,” she laughed.

“It isn’t as useful as specifics,” he said. He patted her hand. “If you ask a general question, then I may answer however I like. I might answer what the peasants ate, where food was grown, or about the great hydroponic gardens in the Adahl’bellanar’dirtharan.”

“All of that sounds interesting,” Eirwen said. “I think I’d be happy listening to you discuss it.”

He chuckled. “Would any answer give you what you seek?”

She shrugged. “When one knows nothing, everything is interesting.”

“Yet it is just as easy to drown oneself in a deluge of information, which leads nowhere constructive. Driven mad in the roundabout of endless explanations, connection one to the other and all in interesting directions but ultimately goes everywhere except where one hoped it would.” He tapped the side of his long nose. “Secrets are not hidden in dark, hidden places, but in plain sight. Where only those who know what to look for might find them.”

“So, you’re saying I should ask directly for what I want,” Eirwen said. “If I hope you intuit it, then you’ll lead me every which way until we end more confused than we began.”

“I enjoy confusion,” he said with a smile. “Yours, especially. When you get lost in a logical problem a small crinkle appears in your brow, right above your nose. Then as you think, your nose wiggles, ma lapinette.”

It didn’t surprise her that Dirthamen understood Orlesian, or even spoke it. He had few issues with language. She suspected he’d picked up the Orlesian from the minds around them as he slipped across their surface thoughts, translating naturally from one to another. The same went with elvhen versus elven, he had no problems speaking more modern variants of the elven language or his own archaic form of the tongue. He’d informed her that Elvhen had several dialects for each territory controlled by a different Evanuris. He spoke Fereldan Common with no failures in inflection; naturally.

_ Ma lapinette. My little bunny. _

“Rabbit is an Orlesian slur for elf,” Eirwen said, though she wasn’t offended.

“Is it?” His brows rose. “Interesting. Perhaps rabbit is a more apt comparison than they realize.”

She frowned, his mind often went in directions she had difficulty following. “Elves are weak, fluffy animals meant to be run down by dogs, torn apart, and thrown into stew?”

Dirthamen laughed. “That is the nobles’ interpretation. Perhaps, the hunter’s interpretation. They of the shiny masks, armor, and scent hounds.” His eyes swung away from her, moving back across the square.  “The Orlesians ought to be taught herbivores are more savage than predators. Then, they may see the irony of their own pronouncements.” He glanced at her. “What do rabbits excel at above all else?”

“Reproduction,” Eirwen said. Her eyes widened. She glanced at the street, there were many nobles but every one was followed by ten or twenty more in their entourage. Over half of the entourage was elven. The guards, human, many of the ladies-in-waiting human, but the servants were all elves. City Elves, rather than Dalish, but they outnumbered the humans three to one. “They have lots and lots of sex.”

He winked. “The poor and poorly educated often do.”

Eirwen pursed her lips. She hated to say he was right, but the image of many elven alienages and poor farms with families of six or seven filled her mind. Washerwomen carrying wailing babes on their backs, trailing a gaggle behind them. They needed hands to work their fields, sew their clothes, or take care of the wash. 

Children were free labor.

“However, what is the most important component in any revolution?”

Her eyes returned to him and she frowned.  _ Why have I never given this much thought? _ The idea of a true revolution was a bygone dream, one buried in a history of failures and generational success only to be met with more failure. A few breaths of freedom then the destruction of their culture. Promises paid with betrayal by their allies.

“Bodies,” he said, answering his own question. “When it comes to rising up against an enemy in revolution, numbers matter.”

Smiling, Eirwen rested her cheek on his arm. A warm soothing ball nestled in her stomach, contentment. After so many years of desperation, feeling lost and confused, it was nice to step out of the darkness. See the world in a new way with accompanying possibilities, even if they were bloody.

Her people were so used to seeing themselves as separate, even powerless. Deriding the elves who lived in the cities when their brethren were the key to carving out a place for themselves without needing to run, hide, or live on the edges of civilization.

“I like listening to you,” she said.

He chuckled. “I suspect you enjoyed your discussions with Fen’Harel as well.”

“Mmm,” Eirwen nodded. “Not as much. Solas’ perspective was interesting, but it never related to anything relevant. He tried to keep his knowledge entirely within the realm of the Fade. Always fascinatingly just out of reach, I suppose.”

“An issue when one attempts to avoid giving too much information,” Dirthamen said. “It’s a beginner’s mistake. Always craft an alternate identity near your reality, lying with the truth is easier than falsehoods. Present oneself as a wise voice of authority and you must say something, by saying nothing we arouse suspicion.”

“That’s good,” Eirwen laughed. “Sometimes, I think you say that just to soothe my ego but it feels nice.”

Dirthamen shrugged. “Why does the wise man have nothing to say? In order to be listened to, he must prove he is worth hearing.”

“Solas led a rebellion against the Evanuris,” she said. “Did he win?”

“Fen’Harel failed,” Dirthamen replied. “He succeeded in raising the Veil and ending Elvhen civilization, but he failed. What he had was rebellion, not revolution. You call him the God of Rebellion and his failure is implicit within the term itself. In order for a revolution to succeed, the majority of the population must give up their comforts and stand against the ruling body. Even with all the horrors of our time, the People did not stand with him.” His fingers traced the back of her knuckles. “Your legends began as warnings about the Dread Wolf. Told and retold as a way to remember their perception of what happened. They did not believe what he had done was necessary, and ensured their version of events would be remembered.”

She pursed her lips, mouth pulling sideways into an amused smirk. “Our conversations are always so heavy before breakfast.”

He chuckled. “Very well, we shall tone it down. Do you wish to hear my theory on the nature of the Orlesian undergarments?”

“No,” she moaned.

“Very well, I will tell you,” he continued. “As it relates to those girls who run around selling tins of gingerbread and Empress Celene’s latest proclamations on the importance of Andrastian holy days.”

“No!” she laughed. “Don’t you dare!”

He patted her hand. “Which in turn relates to you, ma mahvir.”

She snorted. “Where did you find one of Celene’s proclamations?”

“Refuse heap, three streets back,” he replied, producing a folded piece of parchment from a flap in his leathers. “Never mind the stains, it has been properly disinfected. Her people, it seems, paper them on all the local corners.”

Eirwen couldn’t help it, she giggled. “You wanted to eat with those hands?”

“I am offended,” he said in a dry tone, voice utterly bland. “One might think I was not an adult and did not know twenty-seven spells for grime removal and cleanliness for my person.”

“Only twenty-seven?” she teased. “You must be losing it in your old age.”

Dirthamen laughed. “For the hands,” he replied. “If you like, we might explore the nature of cleanliness via skin to skin contact.”

“Maybe after we eat.” Eirwen glanced up at him, her mouth pulled sideways. “I’m not wearing Orlesian panties.”

“Of course not,” he said with a smile. “That would defy the nature of the exercise.”

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as a gift to my good friend laurelinvanyar for her birthday. I hope you enjoyed. Just messing around for fun.


End file.
